In praise of op shops and almost burning jam
Last night instead of going to the first film society film of the year we went for a last minute dinner with our friends, which in itself was just lovely. But there were two extra bonuses, for this is my green fingered, op shopping friend.
First, from her garden, kilograms of plums and nectarines and then from one of her op shop forays two coffee table cookbooks in pristine condition. Cost apparently $2.00 each. She tells me that the Greensborough Savers shop is the best for books so obviously I should go. We do go to Greensborough occasionally because the shopping centre there has different shops to Doncaster, to which we usually go. As my husband likes to say - it's a different demographic. Which is not all bad. Doncaster is very upmarket with designer shops like Chanel and Max Mara, Greensborough is more, shall we say, economical with Rivers and K-Mart. Not that it is a poor area by any means - just poorer than Doncaster I guess and less Chinese. The Chinese love designer labels. Sweeping generalisation I know but obviously Westfield thinks so. Anyway I am determined to go check out the op shop myself though I also suspect that my friend just has a magic touch. When I go, which is very rarely, I never see anything worth having.
I am not a good shopper. I have been shopping with friends who are good shoppers and they just see things that I don't. I am also very timid in shops. Don't like to be accosted by shop assistants and don't like to ask. I don't know where this comes from really. Not liking to be accosted I think comes from a fear of being bludgeoned into something I don't really want, and not asking probably comes from not wanting to appear stupid. Silly is it not?
Anyway I now have these two wonderful books. On the left Robert Carrier's Great Dishes of the World - a 1982 Hard back version. This is a scan of the actual item so you can see how pristine it is. It's coffee table booksize. Of course I have an original paperback version which I treasure and which is falling apart - but then it always had shonky binding. I won't be throwing it away - it is part of my past.
The original hardback was published way back in 1963, my paperback version was published in 1967 - the second reprint in the same year, so it was obviously very successful. Indeed this book is a classic and very possibly the first 'real' cookbook that I bought - although maybe that honour goes to Elizabeth David and French Provincial Cooking. I'm pretty sure I bought them both around the same time, and I cooked endless dishes from each of them. Well I was newly married and trying to please my man. I would cook something new just about every night - from a recipe. Today I rarely use recipes, though I still love to acquire cookbooks. And I am particularly delighted to have this one. It's rather more lavishly illustrated than the original, but mostly with still lives of various things like pasta and sundry vegetables, with the very occasional photograph of an actual dish. There are line drawings too, and inside the cover a plan of Carrier's herb and vegetable garden at Hintlesham Hall - his hotel and restaurant that he managed at the height of his fame in the 80s. I think David went there once on some business function.
I will come back to the book some time.
The other is much more modern and is Australian. Maeve O'Mara and Guy Grossi's Italian Food Safari. The book of the series - which is often how cookbooks come into being these days.
Monika tells me she has this one already and so it was easy to pass it on to me. It is in absolutely pristine condition - you would think it had not even been opened. Maybe it hasn't. Maybe remaindered books find their way into the Savers shops.
This is a modern cookbook and so every recipe has a picture plus lots of gorgeous extra photographs of all things Italian. Alas I didn't see the original series - I'm not really allowed to watch cooking programs. I suppose that's a bit unfair - I could record them and watch them in my own time. But when would that be? I refuse to watch daytime TV - unless bedridden, which I may be for a week or two after this minor operation on my foot. It's not a big deal - a triviality in fact, but apparently I have to keep the foot very still for at least a week, so maybe I shall find myself watching television!
I don't think I can comment much more on the book at the moment until I have read it - yes I actually read cookbooks from cover to cover, but I will do when I have finished it.
In the meantime - thank you so much Monika, and thank you to op shops.
As to the fruit. I have picked out the best plums and will just eat them. I have made a little stewed fruit and frozen it - something to look forward to. I have also made two jars of nectarine chutney and some jars of nectarine jam (two and a bit I think) and a few more jars of plum jam. Initially I was going to combine the plums and the nectarines in one jam but then decided I would separate them out. I don't think I have made a pure nectarine jam before. And it's all done and dusted. Though I almost burnt the jam. Well I was doing three things at once and whilst bottling the chutney the nectarine jam caught a tiny bit. Not enough to cause any real damage though. And whilst I was bottling the nectarine jam the plum jam started sticking too, so I didn't stir it and I think that's alright too. I do hope so because it would be criminal to spoil such a generous gift.
